that last post was rocky

so this one will be apollo?

yeah i dunno, but that last post was rough, even for me.

suffices to say, i have a lot on my mind.

today i started looking into fsu (jena not florida). i'm still just testing the waters a bit, dipping my toe into this pdf and that, reading about what is available/required. i've already pretty much decided that my end goal is to come back here to study, but how that will play out is not yet clear.

first, second, and third things first, second, and third, i need to be focusing on learning how this church lives, building this group of young people here, and studying for my test on the 12th. they should really be respective in order of priority, but that whole "this test will somewhat determine the future possibilites" thing creeps its way to the top here and there.

but today is friday, so that means 3 and 2 will be worked on, and 1 over the weekend for sure. i really like hanging out with these kids. i'm just praying that we will all grow together as long as i am here, and then even more that they will grow even after i leave.

.jrs.

at the tone, the time will be. . . OR parenthetical delightful (i can remember the exact moment i first heard/took notice of the word parenthetical)

00.10

(have i used that title already??)

10 past midnight, great time to have some 20 tabs open.

well now it's 00.30. *beep* (you decide if that was the tone or self censorship)

i just spent 20 discussing german/american keyboard differences (i must have been doing something else, too, but i cannot think of what it was). not a bad topic of discussion, but i still have 20 tabs.

and a catalog of music to organize.

so, oh brave soul, why dost thou squander so oft thine dear sought minutes? or better yet why did i just switch to 9th grade old english?

i'll go ahead and answer both questions with one stone (mixing metaphors/sayings/regular phrases is one of my newest hobbies. as of now that is, so actually my newest.), and i'll do it in a question no less (i once read the best questions are answered by questions. i think it was in a book.):

do you remember my greatest fear? (please don't break into my online accounts)

ǝɹnlıɐɟ :ɹǝʍsuɐ (text-flips are dumb, but i'm leaving it. take it or take it. (click it or click it - single most effective seat belt advertisement delivered by me but never taken by any authority to the best of my knowledge (i would suggest not searching "click it or ticket" on youtube; there is a really angry guy, not a helpful advert)))

i think i've gradually stopped managing my time in an effort to delay the facing of a very big decision in my life, namely what i'm going to do with my life. (is it the hour that makes me so open? is it the ambiguity of the medium of internet? why does the english not have a genitive? it would save me time.)

(all these stupid parenthetical asides have stolen my train of thought.)

(hey i think i found out where i pressed the enter key so much *see last parentheses*)



ok, enough then. i'm not sure if i've actually shared anything here. i am sure i have confused myself. now with only 10 minutes (well now 9) remaining in this first hour of the day, i leave you with two questions:

1. do i use punctuation correctly? i wonder that often.
2. what am i waiting for?

goodnight.

.jrs.





(how did i get so much space at the end of this post. i don't remember hitting the enter key. . . i'll blame aliens)

spazieren

not german for spazing out.

is german for taking a stroll.

germans generally walk faster than americans. well, like any stereotype that will depend on who you're walking with. i worked at peir1 in manhattan, ks, for a month or two when the were moving. the managers there (except for the brown haired girl) walked really fast. brent and andrea. fast walkers.

anyways, i was thinking sometime around november that i wanted to adapt this trait to myself, to become a fast walker. i saw all the drawbacks immediately. for the very reasons i have chosen to walk at a slower or at least moderate pace all these years i was hesitant to begin the process. but i through my caution to my new self made wind and began stepping to my new beat.

it was actually nice. at first, my legs were kind of sore. i walk a couple of miles every day here anyways, so doing it extra fast was a bit of task. nothing too serious, i'll admit, but it was something. i got places faster; that was neat.

for a long time, however, i've been thinking it over, but for some reason i was waiting to turn back the dial. and then came tonight.

maybe it was the coffee wearing off (i found a pretty boss coffee shop downtown today. i'll probably go there more often now), mabye it was the music i was listening to, maybe it was the time, i dunno, but tonight after stammtisch i broke my stride.

and it was beautiful.

maybe it's one of those "you don't know what you have til it's gone" type of things. i started walking slowly and everything, seriously everything was better. smells, sights, sounds, feeling the air and the fence posts, everything. it was so beautiful.

i must say, if you want to have a beautiful evening, walk fast for a couple months and then take a nice slow stroll.

spazieren gehen - german word of the day (well, night technically)

.jrs.

i actually have a couple other thoughts on taking walks, but sadly there are no bonus features on this dvd. maybe if you try inserting disc 2. . .

let's go out to the movies

i went to see the day the earth stood still last night with a couple friends. in favor of lists at the present moment, i have decided to make one concerning the evening:

1. the movie theater was very comfortable, but i still think it is strange to assign seats. it is a german thing, and i'm ok with it, but if anyone would have asked me to move (i chose to sit in a different seat) i would have been annoyed, probably more because the theater was fairly empty, but still.
2. there were indeed a few too many advertisements, especially being that the movie cost 8�€. we were, however, apparently spared the ice cream lady, much like a peanut man i assume, only with ice cream and in a theater.
3. i was amused with the squeakiness of the curtain as it pulled back several times to show the feature presentation. cinestar should not grease the wheels, it is funnier that way.
   
4. the previews were pretty boss. terminator 4 (staring batman and robots), star trek (produced by jj abrams from LOST), liam neeson (whose name i spelled correctly on the first try) beating people up looking for his daughter (shannon from LOST) in paris, and something with meryle streep (whose name i did not spell correctly on the first try. merryle? what was i thinking). there was also one for a german comedy that looks pretty good.
5. the movie was also surprisingly boss. i liked it the whole way through, even when, or maybe especially when, the metal bugs ate everything.
6. i like keanu reeves, and don't understand why people are always doggin on him. he's cool. matrix was cool. i don't get why people gotta be doggin on him.
7. the german rap music dubbed over the normal credit music is strange, but i still liked it.
8. now thanks to wikipedia, i know what a best boy is. i have long since wondered.
9. after the movie, we saw some sort of accident, or rather the remnants there of, on the street. my mind immediately blamed aliens. i have since seen no evidence to lead me to another assumption, leading me to believe jena, germany, may in fact have been attacked by aliens. i later found out that a drunk guy was run over by the straßenbahn.
   
10. the sports bar socca is actually a decent place to hang out, and they are open every day until 4am. every day. until 4am. not bad.
11. even after staying out till 2.30, i was still able to stay awake during church (i also was translating for an african lady named bonnie, so that helped).

most importantly, and worthy of derailing this proper list i have assembled, i understood the movie. not just the main points, and what was going on, i understood what they were saying, and pretty much all of it. i bet if i went through again, i could find things i missed a bit, but probably not many. that was a great encouragement to me. i can speak german fairly well now, and that is good.

i also liked the movie, but that's not as important.

goodnight.

.jrs.

the little things

it's warming up a bit here, at least today. when i walked out the door all bundled up on my way to my german class, i was almost shocked with how warm it was. ok, maybe it would still be better to say how cold it wasn't, because it was still just under 0.

camilla, rocco's youngest daughter said she wished the cold(er) weather would come back because she hasn't had many chances to go sledding yet. it is true, the snow is melting away now, but where we have less opportunity to properly sled we are met with more to slip around just walking down the street.

when i was walking back from stammtisch monday night, i noticed something pretty cool about the slippery mush. about halfway home, the snow had more and more little rocks in it. some had probably been put out to help improve traction, but others had been slowly spread around as the days go by. i could immediatley tell the difference in how i was walking.

the snow and ice hadn't dissapeared, but with the little stones mixed in a bit i was able to walk without slipping at all.

and then, so many times before, my mind jumped the gaps of comparison as if it was trying to flip over cards in a life-sized game of memory. i almost always think of slipping and falling in a spiritual way as much as i do physically, and the same with walking. so i began to wonder what the little rocks were like. it hit me, that all the little things i have been given or had practiced over the years were my rocks. my mom taking me to church every sunday, or even more so doing stuff with us as kids that reinforced Christ's way in our daily lives. the time my dad and i went up to kansas city just a couple years ago for a weekend conference, more so the driving and talking than the event itself. the countless people who have led me through the bible and helped me build different disciplines in my life.

each one of these stone like things in my life is small, sometime insignificant, but when they apply to times that are really unsure, slippery if you will, they help build this fragile ground that kind of floats around just where it is needed to give me more stable footing.

maybe this is also a bit of what it means to be responsible in little things.

.jrs.

walking back tonight

we had englisch stammtisch again this week, so that was nice.

last week, technically we met, but was in another bar, then that was too crowded so we went somewhere else even, and then i was the only one who spoke english natively, so we just all spoke in german. it was good and all, but not the regular englisch stammtisch (which i prefer spelling with the c in english).

so i was walking back for the first time in almost a month and i remembered the feeling of driving back to wichita from college. it was strange seeing all the familiar signs and places, especially as i got nearer. for wichita it was the sign to newton, the old christian radio station on the side of highway-96, driving down maize road sometimes. tonight it was the restaurant place with a petting zoo i'll probably never visit, the church fredrich schiller was married in, the house with the big gummy bear light at the fence, the house with the hops growing on the fence (all well past blooming or frozen to death).

i think i'll always find it strange doing old things again. it's that sort of vague muscle memory that guides your effortlessly through a task that brings a hint of nostalgia, even where it's not really necessary.

as i walked i wondered if that's why i find my walk of faith so strange. i've been on this path pretty much my whole life. reading the bible is routine, praying is remembered, even my doubts are well worn paths. things have become so comfortable that they are strange to me.

that doesn't mean i want to push them aside, not anymore than i want to quit returning home. it just means that the familiar still is not something i am used to for some reason. not really a comment on how things can change or improve, just a sharing of the way things are.

.jrs.

we went sledding today

german word of the day: schlitten fahren - sledding
second german word of the day: porutscher -





truth be told, it was a bit more hiking than sledding, but it was fun. as we were walking back i we caught a glimpse of a small part of town kind of cut off from the rest of the city in a little side valley. night was falling, and the lights were just coming on, silhouetting the houses and streets.

it looked a lot like this christmas decoration my mom used to bring out and put on the ledge downstairs. one little house, fairly colorful with blues and yellows, snow lining the roof and windows and a little tree, complete with a little switch that would turn on a light inside when it was plugged in.

it is beautiful what we see sometimes, even just walking around at dusk, maybe especially walking around at dusk.

.jrs.

i haven't seen a rainbow in a long time

that doesn't mean they don't exist. the last one i remember was over my friend's wedding about a year and a half ago. it was a good one.

i was reading in the first book of moses today. i'm not very far, just got out of the flood. when i read about God's agreement with us not to flood us out again, i realized how long it had been since i had seen one of these little trials to gold.

they're really cool things.

that reminds me of one time when i was flying over the ocean and looked out the window. i can't be sure, but i think i saw the northern lights. that was pretty neat, too, even if i didn't really see it (it was only a couple seconds, looking out a plane window, three years ago, so i can't really trust it)

just because i don't see God's promises in my life all the time, that doesn't mean they aren't there, somewhere, leading to a leprechaun's tree-house.

.jrs.

it is four twenty four in the afternoon

today is warm(er), and that is nice. the sun is also staying here longer, which is even nicer. i guess it's been staying a bit longer since the good old winter solstice. thank you for giving us back our day.

so it's nice to be able to sit in my room without having to turn on the light for another. . .half an hour.

anyway, things are going well. today is bethany jordan hutton's birthday (right??). one year down, thousands to go.

--ok this was a lame first post for 2009. i'll get back to posting for reals soon--

.jrs.